2nd Amendment

Chicago police officer and two other people were killed in an attack at a South Side hospital Monday afternoon that sent medical personnel and police scrambling through halls, stairwells and even the nursery in search of victims and the shooter before he was found dead.

Officer Samuel Jimenez, on the force less than two years, was gunned down as he went to the aid of other officers who had been called to Mercy Hospital & Medical Center around 3:20 p.m. about an assault. Jimenez, 28, was married with three small children. He’s the second Chicago police officer killed in the line of duty this year, the most since 2010 when five officers were fatally shot. The first was Near North District Cmdr. Paul Bauer, killed Feb. 13 outside the Thompson Center.

“Those officers that responded today saved a lot of lives,” said Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson. “They were heroes because we just don’t know how much damage (the shooter) was prepared to do.”

Police had been called to the hospital after Juan Lopez, 32, confronted emergency room doctor Tamara O’Neal, apparently over a “broken engagement,” sources said. By the time Jimenez and his partner arrived on the scene, Lopez had shot O’Neal repeatedly, standing over her as he fired the last shots, according to police sources and witnesses.

“When they pulled up, they heard the gunshots, and they did what heroic officers always do — they ran toward that gunfire,” Johnson said. “So they weren’t assigned to that particular call, but they went because that’s what we do.”

Lopez, who sources say had a concealed carry license, exchanged gunfire with Jimenez and other officers as he ran into the hospital. Jimenez was shot in the lobby as Lopez continued firing. A squad car was hit, and a bullet hit the holster and lodged in the gun barrel of another officer, according to Johnson.

Dayna Less, 25, a first-year pharmacy resident, was hit as she walked out of an elevator. “That woman got off an elevator and was shot, why?” Johnson asked. Lopez was found inside the hospital, apparently suffering a wound to the head. Johnson said it was unclear how he was shot.

At a press conference late Monday night, Emergency Department director Patrick Connor grew emotional as he described O’Neal as dedicated to her church and patients. The 38-year-old physician graduated from the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Chicago in 2016 and had worked as a resident at Mercy for two years. She raised money for disadvantaged children and led her church choir, Connor said, choking up with emotion and pausing frequently.

“That was her one thing she wanted … to be able to go to church on Sunday,” Connor said, adding that they assured her she could. “We’ll make sure you go to church on Sunday.”

Less recently graduated from Purdue University and started working at the hospital in July.

Michael Davenport, Mercy’s chief medical officer, said the hospital had conducted an active shooter drill last month. About 200 patients were being treated in the hospital on Monday, but authorities only evacuated the emergency room. The hospital’s emergency plans include barricading doors and ensuring patient safety.

In the confusion of the first moments, it was unclear how many people were shot, how many officers were among them and how many shooters there were.

As dispatchers and responding officers tried to make sense of the scene, reports came in of an officer shot somewhere in the lobby, a woman and an assistant also wounded. Finally, there was word of the gunman apparently shot in the head.

Even then, dispatchers continually checked on officers’ status and whether another gunman might still be on the loose.

“How many officers shot?” a dispatcher asked repeatedly.

“Trying to find that out,” an officer radioed.

Officers rushed to lock down the first floor of the hospital for a search, then closed off the stairwells. “We’re checking for victims,” a dispatcher said. “We also need officers on the third floor to check the nursery.”

By 4 p.m., the officer was being taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center, where he died.

Meanwhile, medical personnel continued to be brought out of the hospital by police, who radioed ahead to warn officers outside. At 4:40 p.m., the hospital tweeted that “patients are safe.”

Steven Mixon, an emergency room clerk, said he had received a call hours earlier, around 1 p.m., from a man he believed to be the ex-fiance of the woman shot outside the hospital. “He called and asked to speak with his fiancee,” said Mixon. “And she said, ‘Oh, just tell him I’m in with a patient.’ ”

Mixon said he got off work around 3 p.m. and waited for an Uber in front of the hospital. “I look up and I see her being harassed by some gentleman,” he said. “She was trying to avoid him and move around. And when she saw me, she waved for me to come that way.”

Mixon said he started to run toward his colleague to help when Lopez fired. “I guess it wasn’t my time to go because if I had made it to her, I would have been dead too,” Mixon said.

He watched as the gunman then shot at a police car and shot again at the woman, who had fallen to the ground. Mixon said he ran back into the emergency room, where it was “total chaos.”

“Everyone was running every which way,” he said. “We ran into surgery because they had locked doors. That’s when we heard more shots inside the hospital.”

Mixon said he remembers the woman looking beautiful this year at the hospital’s annual gala. “She was a sweetheart, just a sweetheart. What a fireball.

“Before all this, she was looking forward to getting married,” he said. “Talking about dresses, all of that. But then something happened and it was called off.”

James Gray was coming out of the clinic area when he said he saw a man in a black coat, black hat and dark pants shoot a woman three times in the chest. The man and the woman had been walking and talking to each other before the shooting, he said. The gunman stood over the woman and shot her three more times after she fell to the ground, said Gray. Then a squad car turned its lights on and came down the drive and the gunman shot at the squad car.

Liberals are nothing but Nazi scum. They hate guns until they need them.

A Democratic congressman from Long Island implied that Americans should grab weapons and oppose President Trump by force, if the commander-in-chief doesn’t follow the Constitution.

Rep. Tom Suozzi made the remark to constituents at a town hall last week, saying that folks opposed to Trump might resort to the “Second Amendment.”

“It’s really a matter of putting public pressure on the president,” Suozzi said in a newly released video of the March 12 talk in Huntington. “This is where the Second Amendment comes in, quite frankly, because you know, what if the president was to ignore the courts? What would you do? What would we do?”

A listener then blurts out, “What’s the Second Amendment?”

The left-leaning Democrat says, “The Second Amendment is the right to bear arms.”

The spectators laughed — some nervously. Republicans were not amused.

“This video is incredibly disturbing. It’s surreal to watch a sitting member of Congress suggest that his constituents should take up arms against the president of the United States,” said National Republican Campaign Committee spokesman Chris Martin.

Suozzi political adviser Kim Devlin denied the pol was “advocating for an armed insurrection.”

But the Suozzi campaign at the same time seemed to double down on the comments, as they forwarded a line penned by Thomas Jefferson that called for armed resistance.

“What country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance. Let them take arms,” the quote said.

Suozzi’s comment seems to conflict with his recent push for gun control following the Parkland, Florida, school shooting.

Suozzi even participated in the March 14 student walkout for gun control outside the US Capitol — and called on the young people of his district to back tightened gun laws.

“I think we should engage the high school students of #NY03, and all of Long Island, to promote gun violence prevention legislation,” he said in a Feb. 21 tweet.

Trump himself has in the past used language similar to Suozzi’s. During the 2016 campaign, he told a crowd at a rally in North Carolina that if Hillary Clinton were elected and able to nominate a Supreme Court justice, there would be nothing that gun supporters could do. He then added: “Although the Second Amendment people — maybe there is, I don’t know.”

The remark was widely seen as a veiled call for violence, though Trump denied that was his meaning.

Suozzi, a first-term congressman elected in 2016, is seeking re-election this fall. He formerly served as Nassau County executive.

He is expected to easily win the Democratic primary and face GOP challenger Dan Debono, a former US Navy SEAL, in the general election.

A Texas man is being hailed as a hero after he used his firearm to stop a rape occurring on a hike-and-bike trail, in another pro-Second Amendment story you won’t typically see in the mainstream media.

Austin resident Josh Williams, 39, remembered hearing screams as he was jogging during the early morning hours of September 15.

“Apparently he came up behind her and tackled her,” Williams described to KVUE last Wednesday, thankful he was in the right place at the right time.

Williams, who carries a phone, flashlight and gun during his jogs, recounted he ran in the direction of the screams and witnessed a woman being raped.

“I came up, pulled my gun and told him to get off of her,” he said. “Get on your knees and show me your hands.”

At the time, Williams was carrying his Glock 43, which he says he had considered not bringing that morning.

The suspected rapist, later identified as Richard Jordan McEachern, 22, professed to Williams he knew the woman, however the woman claimed she’d never met him.

As the victim ran toward Williams still hesitant about her rescuer, McEachern escaped with the woman’s shoes and shorts but was later nabbed by police.

liams says it was perhaps “divine intervention” that placed him in the position to be a hero.

“I could’ve been two minutes earlier and passed the whole thing,” Williams stated, adding he’s now friends with the woman who is immensely grateful.

McEachern was booked in the Travis County Jail on a $200,000 bond and faces sexual assault charges.

Good Guy with a Gun: Stephen Willeford Named as Man Who Stopped Texas Shooter

The “good guy with a gun” who reportedly shot and wounded the alleged gunman at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Sunday has been named in media reports as Stephen Willeford, 55, a local plumber.

The Daily Mail reports that a local resident claims Willeford managed to shoot the alleged gunman, Devin Patrick Kelley, 26, between the plates of the body armor that he was wearing. Willeford is described as a plumber and motorcycle enthusiast with no military experience but with excellent aim.

According to an eyewitness interviewed by KENS 5, Willeford stopped the gunman by firing at him with his own rifle from outside the church, then by pursuing him afterwards:

Our neighbor, he’s a very good guy, a very big Christian, he’s the nicest man on the planet, he’ll do anything for anyone around here. We’ve known him for years. He’s childhood friends with my dad. He … came with his [gun], and he took cover behind a car, and he shot the guy, I’m not sure if it was inside the church or the guy was coming out, but if it wasn’t for him, the guy wouldn’t have stopped. And then that’s when the guy got in his vehicle and drove off. And our friend shot through the window at him, trying to get him again, and then he apparently crashed down the road.

He added: “If it wasn’t for our friend … there might have been more lives lost.”

Local law enforcement officials reported that the gunman dropped his weapon after being shot at by the “local citizen,” i.e. Willeford, whose name has not been officially confirmed.

According to numerous media reports, Willeford flagged down local Johnnie Langendorff, and the two pursued Kelley in Langendorff’s truck until Kelley drove off the road. He was found dead in his vehicle, though it is not yet clear whether he took his own life or had been wounded earlier by Willeford.

Both Willeford and Langendorff are being hailed as heroes for confronting the gunman.

Critics on social media argue that the “good guy with a gun” did not prevent the gunman from killing 26 and wounding dozens more.

USMC War Vet Faces Prison for Legally Owned Gun Unregistered in New Jersey

A former United States Marine who traveled to New Jersey with a gun he legally owned — but which was not registered in New Jersey — is facing three years in prison for firearm law violations.

The three years is the minimum sentence that former Marine Sergeant Hisashi Pompey has to serve before he can even be eligible for parole under New Jersey’s strict gun control laws.

ABC 7 reports that Pompey did “three tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan for which he received medals for bravery.” He was a military police sergeant.

Six years ago Pompey visited New Jersey and brought his legally owned handgun with him from Virginia. During the course of the night, one of Pompey’s friends got involved in a fight, retrieved the gun, and “carried it into a confrontation with police.” Police arrested Pompey’s friend then arrested Pompey, as well, for having brought an unregistered handgun into the state.

He is now asking Governor Chris Christie (R) to grant him clemency. Pompey said, “Only help I am asking for is from the governor, that’s the only one, everyone from judges to lawyers say the only person who will help me now is the governor.”

Pompey has a wife and children at home, all of whom he will have to leave for a minimum of three years if Christie does not act.

In April 2015, Christie pardoned Pennsylvania resident Shaneen Allen, who was arrested in 2013 for carrying a legally owned handgun in her car. Allen even had a Pennsylvania permit to carry the gun, but New Jersey does not recognize Pennsylvania’s permit.

On December 23, 2015, Christie pardoned U.S. Marine Joshua Velez, a Massachusetts concealed carry permit holder who was arrested over a year earlier for bringing his 9mm handgun into the state of New Jersey.

The pardon said:

WHEREAS, Joshua Velez has made a written application to the Governor for a pardon for the aforesaid offenses, and the State Parole Board, upon request of the Governor, in accordance with the law, has made an investigation of the facts and circumstances surrounding said application for a Pardon;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, CHRIS CHRISTIE, Governor the State of New Jersey, by virtue of the authority conferred upon me by the Constitution of the State of New Jersey and the statutes of this State, do hereby grant Joshua Velez a full and free Pardon for all criminal charges arising from the arrest occurring September 6, 2015, to include the aforesaid crimes, and this Order is applicable solely to said criminal charges and to no other.